I remember Fr Ripperger gave a lecture on detachment a few years ago. It seems almost prophetic looking back on it now. Our priest recommended that we read or re-read the book He Leadeth Me and With God in Russia by Walter J. Ciszek S.J. A young American priest sent to Poland who was imprisoned and exiled in Siberia for 20 years beginning with the invasion of the USSR into Poland during WWII. I would highly recommend it to anyone struggling with our current situation like I have been off and on. A few excerpts; “Through the long years of isolation and suffering, God had led me to an understanding of life and his love that only those who have experienced it can fathom. He had stripped away from me many of the external consolations, physical and religious, that men rely on and had left me with a core of seemingly simple truths to guide me.” “That same lesson each of us must learn, difficult or not. How easy it is, in times of ease, for us to become dependent on our routines, on the established order of our day-to-day existence, to carry us along. We begin to take things for granted, to rely on ourselves and on our own resources, to ‘settle in’ in this world and look to it for our support...Friends and possessions surround us, one day is followed by the next, good health and happiness for the most part are ours....It is the ‘status quo’ that we rely on, that carries us from day to day, and somehow we begin to lose sight of the fact that under all these things and behind all these things it is God who supports and sustains us. We go along, taking for granted that tomorrow will be very much like today, comfortable in the world we have created for ourselves... and give little thought to God at all. Somehow, then, God must contrive to break through those routines of ours...”Somehow, then, God must contrive to break through those routines of ours. “One thing only need be of great concern to us in all this seeming upheaval and catastrophe: to be faithful to God and to look to him in everything, confident of his love and constancy, aware that this world and this new order was not our lasting city any more than the previous one had been, and striving always to know his will and to do it each day of our lives.” “And then one day, it dawned on us. God granted us the grace to see...the answer to our temptation.”“Our whole purpose [in Russia] --as indeed in our whole lives --was to do the will of God. Not the will of God as we might wish it...or as we thought in our poor human wisdom it ought to be. But rather the will of God as God envisioned it and revealed it to us each day...His will for us was the 24 hours of each day: the people, the places, the circumstances he set before us in that time.” “Our dilemma (in the logging camp) came from our frustration at not being able to do what we thought the will of God ought to be in this situation, at our inability to work as we thought God would surely want us to work, instead of accepting the situation itself as his will.” “No situation is ever without its worth and purpose in God's Providence. It is a very human temptation to feel frustrated by circumstances, to feel overwhelmed and helpless in the face of the established order, whether that order is an NKVD prison, or the whole Soviet system, or the ‘status quo’... or the whole rotten oppressive world!”“He may not be able to change the ‘system’, anymore that I could change conditions in that prison, but he is not for that reason excused from acting at all. Many men feel frustrated, or disappointed, or even defeated, when they find themselves face to face with a situation or an evil they cannot do much about ...(God) does expect him, though, to act as he would have him act in the circumstances ordained by his will and his Providence nor will God's grace be lacking to help him act.”“He was asking me to forget about my ‘powerlessness’ against the ‘system’,and to look instead to the immediate needs of those around me, this day, in order that I might do everything that it was in my power to do by prayer and example. That was all he was asking of me or expecting of me. It was all I had to do, but it was plenty -and it could not be done while I sat feeling sorry for myself.”
Every change in the Church or being proposed in the Church is one that the Protestant Sects have already made , often several centuries ago, to their own immense harm. The Obligation for Sunday Mass being a biggie. This is why Protestant Churches are empty on Sundays and closed all week.. How is it possible at the moment that every single change that the Holy Father , the Cardinals and Bishops at the moment lead to grave harm and tend to the destruction of the Church? This is because all such changes are whispered int heir ears in the first place by Satan and the Demons. ..and how is it that our Highest Clergy listen to such whisperings? It is because of their personal pride which Satan encourages and fosters. ..and what is the source of such destructive pride? The source of such pride is that they no longer Fall to their knee to pray. Thus they are led by the noses by the Fallen Angels, the Enemy of Mankind.
That, indeed, plus we can’t see anything due to our glasses fogging up from our breath escaping upwards. The blind leading the blind
Thank you Don. I have read He Leadeth Me at 2 times. The second time a few years ago. What wisdom. I dont like what is happening but I remind myself God is permitting it. And He always acts for our best good. It all comes down to trust.
And obedience, which I personally struggle with very much due to my rebelliousness and pride. He Leadeth Me is excellent, it is only 200 pages long but it has such profound wisdom and humility in it especially in times such as these.
Don_D, it sounds like you're disobedient because you're rebellious and you're rebellious because you're disobedient. Well there's hope because that's a double negative which means you ain't. Safe in the Mercy of Jesus!
Vatican Urges Catholics to Share Ramadan Historian of jihad slams Holy See's surrender to Islam by Jules Gomes • ChurchMilitant.com • May 2, 2020 220 Comments VATICAN CITY (ChurchMilitant.com) - The Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue is encouraging Christians to join in the Islamic iftar 'ritual' meal on the occasion of the Muslim festival of Ramadan. In a Ramadan greeting to "Muslim brothers and sisters" Friday, the Vatican dicastery called upon Christians and Muslims to "protect together" mosques and churches and quoted the prophet Isaiah 56:7 affirming that "a place of worship of any religion therefore is 'a house of prayer.'" "For us, your Christian friends, it is a propitious time to further strengthen our relationships with you, by greeting you, meeting you on this occasion and, where possible, by sharing in an Iftar with you," the statement read. Speaking to Church Militant, world-renowned Islamic scholar Robert Spencer said he was disturbed by the Vatican's "assumptions that arise from Vatican II declarations about Muslims together with us adoring the God of Abraham." "By participating in iftars, Christians are helping celebrate an imperative to conquer and subjugate them," he noted. "Iftar is not just a meal. It is the breaking of the Ramadan fast every evening. Ramadan is a month devoted to intensifying one's observance of Islam and growing more righteous." "In Islam, the most righteous deed of all is jihad, which most prominently involves warfare against and the subjugation of non-Muslims. A hadith has a Muslim asking Muhammad: 'Instruct me as to such a deed as equals Jihad (in reward).' Muhammad replied, 'I do not find such a deed' (Bukhari 4.52.44)," Spencer explained. Author of the bestselling The History of Jihad: From Muhammad to ISIS, the historian told Church Militant he was also shocked by the Vatican drawing a parallel "between the destruction of churches and mosques in this age or any age." "Such equivalence demonstrates historical illiteracy as throughout history thousands, if not tens of thousands, of churches have been turned into mosques in order to demonstrate the superiority of Islam over Christianity, and the victory of Muslims over Christians," Spencer observed. (read the rest at https://www.churchmilitant.com/news/article/vatican-urges-catholics-to-join-ramadan-feast) +
